Camacho Corojo Churchill

Corojo seed makes superb tobacco, but it’s a fickle leaf. Because it is vulnerable to disease and yields fewer leaves per acre than newer hybrids, growing Corojo is far from easy. But in 2007 the crop in the Jamastran Valley of Honduras was superb, and today that Corojo leaf wrapper is being used to roll Camacho Corojo cigars. Camacho is a Miami company (now a subsidiary of Davidoff of Geneva) that earned some of its highest ratings ever from Cigar Aficionado this year, and this No. 5 ranking of the Camacho Corojo Churchill represents Camacho’s highest finish ever in our Top 25. There’s a lot to like about this cigar—it’s a big, hefty smoke, medium to full bodied, and loaded with rich, leathery flavors and notes of earth and dark fruit. At less than $7, it’s also a bargain, one of the best buys on our list. While the term Corojo is used quite liberally throughout the industry, it specifically refers to a seed variety created by the Rodriguez family on a tobacco plantation in Pinar del Río, Cuba, known as El Corojo. The wrapper leaves grown from the seed developed by the Rodriguez clan had flavor and color unlike anything else. Cuba no longer grows Corojo-seed tobacco, but Julio Eiroa, patriarch of the Eiroa family, former owners of Camacho, still grows tobacco from Corojo seed on his farm in the fertile Jamastran Valley of Honduras.